Knave Of Hearts. Shari Anton

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      Prologue

      April, 1109

      Stephen wished he could cheer his half brother out of his morose mood. He’d tried and failed, probably because by getting angry and confronting King Henry, Stephen bore some blame for getting Richard into trouble to begin with.

      Within Wilmont’s richly furnished chambers in Westminster Palace, Richard slumped in a high-backed chair, a goblet of wine dangling from his fingertips, a frown on his face. No wonder. He’d been forced to accept the guardianship over the widow and orphan of Wilmont’s greatest enemy, a man who’d damn near succeeded in getting Richard killed.

      Stephen still had trouble believing events had taken such a strange turn, but King Henry was adamant and they must all deal as best they could with this unpalatable situation. For his part, Stephen would leave at sunrise for Normandy, to assess the extent of young Philip’s estates and determine if the boy’s relatives posed a threat. The errand should take a month, or maybe a week or two more, to complete.

      Which left Stephen this one night to secure a betrothal bargain with Carolyn de Grasse, the heiress who awaited him in a bedchamber on a lower floor of the palace.

      Stephen gave Richard an affectionate shake on the shoulder. “Get some sleep. I will see you come morn.”

      “Do try to stay out of trouble,” Richard said.

      Stephen didn’t take offense. ’Twas the several goblets of quickly quaffed wine talking. Of his two siblings, Gerard, the eldest brother and powerful baron of Wilmont, was the more overbearing and quickest to censure. Despite his brothers’ tendency to overprotectiveness, Stephen wouldn’t trade either of them for all the riches in the kingdom.

      He just wished they wouldn’t take every opportunity to remind him of his tendency to give in to his whims of fancy, which they considered his weakness. ’Struth, bound by duty, his brothers possessed neither the time nor inclination to follow the flight of an eagle simply to see where it landed. Staid fellows, both. A repugnant fate Stephen intended to forswear.

      He chided Richard. “Pray tell, how can I get into trouble by spending the night with the woman I plan to wed?”

      For the first time in hours, the corner of Richard’s mouth twitched in amusement. “Oh, I can think of a way or two.”

      “Never fear. I have not yet failed to thoroughly pleasure a woman whose good opinion I wish to enjoy,” he boasted, and was rewarded with a wider smile and a grunt of disbelief. “Now I must go. ’Twould not do for me to be late for a tryst with my betrothed.”

      “Lady Carolyn is not your betrothed, yet.”

      “Give me an hour and she will be begging to marry me.”

      To the heartening sound of Richard’s soft chuckle, Stephen left Wilmont’s chambers and strode down the palace passages and stairways, wishing Gerard was here to help Richard.

      Unfortunately, Gerard wasn’t on good terms with King Henry at the moment, so he’d sent Stephen and Richard to court at Westminster in his stead. While keeping a careful watch for any shifts of power that always accompanied large gatherings of England’s nobility, Stephen had also taken the time to study the current crop of unwed heiresses.

      A man in his position needed to marry, to continue the family line and provide heirs for his holdings. Stephen intended to do his duty, but on his own terms. That he’d finally found a woman damn near perfect for his needs, Carolyn de Grasse, he considered a heaven-sent twist of fate.

      A few years older than his own two and twenty years, newly widowed for the second time, Carolyn wanted a young, virile man as her third husband. She wanted a man to pleasure her in bed and sire her children, then otherwise make himself scarce so she could oversee her lands with no husbandly interference.

      Stephen kept the “scarce” condition firmly in mind—the best part of the arrangement to his way of thinking. He could fulfill his duty to his family and provide an heir to his estates, all without becoming staid.

      Since he’d already proven his prowess to Carolyn yesterday, leaving her languid and sated, he harbored no worries over tonight’s outcome. He would pleasure her once more, explain the need for his upcoming journey, and secure her agreement to accept no other man as her husband in his absence. When he returned from Normandy, he’d present his suit to her father.

      From the nearby abbey came the peal of deep-toned bells, announcing the hour of matins. Midnight. Right on time. He tapped lightly on the chamber door and softly called Carolyn’s name. Receiving no answer, he pushed on the latch, and finding the door unlocked, eased it open.

      The flame from a thick tallow candle cast enough mellow light for him to inspect the chamber. Sparse, Stephen judged the furnishings. Truly, he’d have thought the room unoccupied if not for the human-size lump curled in the middle of the bed, huddled completely under a wool coverlet.

      It didn’t bode well that Carolyn had fallen asleep. He’d expected her to remain awake with anticipation. But then she’d left the door unbolted and a candle lit for him to see by, and she was in the bed waiting for him to come to her.

      Planning a seductive awakening, Stephen slid the bolt, then shucked his tunic and sherte and tossed them onto the small oak table. As he sat on the only stool in the room and removed the first of his boots, a soft gasp came from the direction of the bed.

      Bare-chested, boot in hand, Stephen stared at the woman propped up on an elbow. Within the space of a heartbeat he noted hair of sable brown, not auburn. Skin of ivory, not porcelain.

      Hellfire. Not Carolyn.

      He recognized the woman who stared at him with eyes the color of polished pewter. He hadn’t seen her in five, no six years, but he knew the lovely lady’s name as well as his own.

      Marian de Lacy.

      They’d lost their innocence together, he and Marian, in her father’s stables. During secret trysts filled with eager, exploring touches, in a fever of sense-banishing youthful lust, they’d discovered the thrill of robust, if unskilled, coupling.

      Stephen searched for a way to end the shocked silence, but came up with nothing better than a nod and her name.

      “Marian.”

      She glanced at the door, then at his discarded garments.

      “Sweet heaven, Stephen. What are you doing here?” she asked in a loud whisper.

      Knowing women as he did, Stephen suspected that blurting out the truth might not be wise. A man did not tell a former bed mate that he’d come to make love to another woman and hope to escape unscathed.

      “I…um…”

      Marian shushed him, then eased out of bed while arranging the coverlet into a jumbled heap. When she stood, her sable hair tumbled over her shoulders and СКАЧАТЬ